Bradz

This is a long read and im sure most will give up after a few lines lol.

I wrote as its my true life story and ive seen a few people recently get messed up and in simialr situtaiuon that i did.

I did have a progress journal on here but i aint updated in 7 months due to what has been going on.

Go get a Cup of tea if your going to read this all

Please excuse the spelling and punctuation.

Where do I begin?

I suppose as far back as I can remember which takes me back to when I was about 10 years old. I was what you would call Chubby but what all other kids called fatty or fatty boom boom or on the odd day Fatso.

Being a 10 year old kid you don’t pay much attention but it does get to you but thinking back it just made me eat more, Don’t get me wrong I was far from obese but I was on the larger end of the scale and name calling from other kids was common practice.

Thinking back this was everyday life until I was about 14 or so when I did start to enjoy sports at school but still was a bit chubby compared to others kids of my age.

Leaving school at 16 to start an apprenticeship, Things got worse, I now found myself in a job where eating Rubbish was just too easy and the 10am Breakfast everyday was two HUGE bacon and sausage rolls with some crisps and chocolate to finish, Fizzy Juice was a Must. Lunch time was another trip to the Burger van to have a cheeseburger and chips, thinking back it make me cringe but it was my routine and I couldn’t see past it.

Turning 17 and passing my driving test did make things better as the joys of paying and running a car cut back on any money I had so did lose a lot of weight but I was short lived.

At the age of 19 I was told I was going to be a Father, WOW I thought, so the baby arrived and I settled into a new home with my partner and the new born baby, By God did I put on the pounds, Takeaways were a common meal sometimes 5 days a week, Instead of magazines to read, I had takeaway menus.

At the age of 19 I got myself a part time job as a doorman (Bouncer) for some extra money but after 5 or so hours standing in a cold doorway you are starving and at 3am my meal of choice was normally a LARGE Doner Kebab before bed. The pounds flew on and the waist size grew and so did the passing comments, The first and most common abuse you get when you throw someone out of a club in my case was Fat ones, Ill be back for you fatty they would say, or the likes of Bet you can catch be you Fat so and so. I laughed these off with my colleagues but deep down these got to me and tore me up inside. Things got too much and me and my partner split up and working as a doorman turned into a full time job and so did the eating junk food at silly times of the day or night.

Fast forward a few years until I am 21 and I meet my current partner (now my wife), She see’s me for who I am and says how I look don’t bother her, picture in your head the stereotypical doorman, Big fat, shaved head and a goatee beard, well that’s me, What a Catch. Things are good and I have a great girl by my side who funnily enough is not big at a guess back then she was a nice shapely size 12, what the hell did she see in me I ask myself now.

She must have seen something as a few years go by and she now shares my passion for food and we both grow bigger and bigger, not from reading this its sounds like we were huge, not quite but we are on the bloody larger end of the scale and by the time our first child is born a few years later I weigh in at around 18 stone and at a guess the wife about 17 stone, That’s a bloody big food Bill and Bloody big bed. Life goes on and another year later our second child is born, this was my turning point, Looking at some pictures of myself with our new born it hit home and hit home hard just how big I was. Enough was enough, I told myself I was joining a Gym and I was going to get in shape, but of course everybody laughed at it and the comments were worse and inside my head really hurt. Every person I told I had joined a gym made a comment but this made me more determined to give it a go.

Day one at the Gym, I weight myself and tip the scales at 18stone 4lbs maybe not too heavy but I am only 5 foot 6 so it’s bloody heavy. I ask my friend to take a Picture of me so I can look at it and make sure I give this my best shot. I make my way up to the gym but there is a small problem, I haven’t got a clue what I should be doing, being a Big Shaved headed stubborn Male, the last thing I want to do is ask someone for advice so I have a bash at everything but in reality I just didn’t have a clue. This was the drill for about 6 months, 3 nights a week I would head to the gym and think I could loose weight, afterwards I was sore and tired so what better way to recover with a big meal and normally not a healthy one and my weight stayed the same, I got stronger but still looked what I would say, “A Bloody mess”

A change of job means I am now working a 36 hour week and could potentially follow a good diet and sort out my routine, I have access to the internet during the day so I spend a long time day after day reading Bodybuilding website, Dieting websites, YouTube for videos and now realising the last 6 months I have done it all wrong and its been a waste of 6 months.

I decide to start a fresh and build myself a diet based on what I have read on the internet, this is where I start to realise its not as easy as it looks and that I don’t have a clue what is right and what is wrong to eat so another few months pass and although I am losing weight, its bloody slow and some weeks I gain weight and become depressed and a very nasty person to be around, blaming my wife for her lack of support. She tries her best but I am obsessed that I have to loose weight and feel everyone is laughing and against me.

Everyday is the same, when I am not working I am on the internet reading and looking up as much info as I can, eventually I build myself a diet plan based on high protein and low carbs and I give it a go, I now train 5 days a week and my weight starts to fall off. People start to notice and say nice things to me, I become hooked. I follow this routine and after 6 months I loose almost 2 stone in weight, everywhere I go people comment on how well I look. I am amazed and I love the new attention I am getting. But things change and hit what you would call a brick wall and my weight stays the same again, week after week, people are still saying nice thing but in my eyes I am still fat and deep down I am screaming to do better.
I am introduced to a Processional bodybuilder who knows his stuff and I swallow my pride and ask for advice, He telling me some very usual things and points me in the right direction and I get my head down and start working my butt off again and it works the weight starts to drop but slowly but after the advice I was given I now know that due to the fact I am doing a lot of weights and gaining muscle my weight wont shift that quick and I should be going by what the mirror tells me and not the scales. After 6 months the different in my body is scary and everywhere I go people comment on my looks, if I am in a Club or a pub girls pay me attention like I have never seen before. I now weigh around 16 stone but I have dropped from a 40” waist to an amazing 34” waist.


I now enjoy the gym more than I ever did and I pretty much base my whole life around it, 5 days per week I head to the gym and do my routine, I eat every 3 hours and love it but its not as easy as it sounds, come the weekend I take a break from the gym and try and relax with the family, this is my downfall and I eat like a pig, its very common to gain 7lbs of weight over the weekend, heading the gym on a Monday, Depressed and Feeling fat again, This is how things are for the next few months and make me dread the weekends but I just cant help myself. Most Fridays I tip the scales at around 16stone but for me this is just not good enough, I want more, want to be like the bodybuilders I see on TV and in the magazines, I tell my friends this and they laugh, This upsets me and I now want it more than ever, I speak to my bodybuilder friend who gave me that advice around 6 months back and he shocks me and tells me that I could do it and could compete in a first timers bodybuilders competition if I can sort my diet and dedicate myself 100%, he explains that it will not be easy and maybe have some serious effects on my emotions etc but I want to try. Its around 12 weeks from the date of the competition and my weight is 15 13lbs, I have such a huge amount to do but only 12 weeks to do it, My Bodybuilder friend writes me a detailed diet plan which is seems impossible to stick too but I manages and follow it 100%. After 2 weeks I have lost an amazing 6 lbs and start to notice my body changes almost by the day, I am getting up at 6.30am for 20mins cardio before breakfast and before I head to work then back for my weights workout at 7pm, its hard work but I am coping. 10 weeks from the Comp and my determination is through the roof, I spend all day eating, reading and training like a bodybuilder, I love it and I loose another 6lbs, I now weight 15stone 1lbs and people are taking notice, I am like a kid in a sweetie shop, people in the gym are now asking me for advice and taking notice of me.



10 weeks out

Things are starting to get hard, My Bodybuilder friend has gave me a new 10 weeks out diet, which has less carbs in it and tells me I may start to feel a bit tired and maybe even get grumpy, I assure him I will be fine and set to work on getting to my goal and making myself and my family proud. By this time my fat former self is gone and I am now eating and training like I am a bodybuilder, gone are the XXL Tops I train in and they are replaced by pukka Gym vests to show off how well I look.




9weeks out:

Another a week passes and I am now 14stone 10lbs, I am 9 weeks out from the competition and doing well but a bombshell is dropped by my Bodybuilder friend, I don’t even know how to pose, So twice a week he invites me to be shown and learn some posing routines after my workouts, I am shocked this drains me of all energy and is an eye opener, I can honestly say it’s the hardest thing I have ever done and is unbelievably hard, I struggle on and get to grips with it although in my mind I am very worried that I wont cope. I now see that as well as having the perfect diet and the Right training routine I now need to make sure I have to make sure I know the routines and mandatory poses that the judges will be looking for, I am a nervous wreck and start to get very tired and lose my motivation.

6 weeks out:

I am drained, I am tired and I am not coping, I can’t get my ass out of bed for my essential morning cardio and I am struggling for the much needed energy for my workouts, I am now 14 stone 5lbs and although looking very well, in my head I keep telling myself I cant do and start to get depressed, is it the food or is it the diet? I don’t know and every day I think about pulling out of the comp, I keep telling myself I am not ready and I just cant do that Morning cardio, I do my weights at night, then the cardio, then my posing routines, by the time I get home at 10pm I have been at the gym for 3 hours and I am a mess, Things with my wife have got worse and I can barely speak to her with shouting at her. She keeps saying to quit and not let it get to me, there is no rush she says but to me there is, I cant let myself or the people around me down, things go from bad to worse and I walk out on my wife, This is the start of self destruct mode for me and things go from bad to worse, I don’t see my kids, My parents are against me, I have nowhere to stay, what the hell am I doing, I ask myself over and over but I keep telling myself that I wont be beaten and still thing I can make the comp in 6 weeks time. At work things are just as bad, I am short tempered, I have had pretty much no sleep and it effects my job and my work mates, I am advised to take a few weeks off to sort my head out and my family

5 weeks out:

Do stop and sort my family out? No I don’t, I have come this far I tell myself and I will get to my goal. By now training is getting harder and harder but I am still making progress and my weight is 14 stone 3lbs and every time I look in the mirror it even shocks me but deep down I know I am struggling and the lack of morning cardio and stress is putting huge strain on me, I know deep down I wont make it but people around me tell me I still can so I ignore the cries from my wife and family and carry on.
Every day I am struggling and I distance myself from my friends and in my eyes nothing else apart from my gym matters, When I can I do my morning cardio if I cant I do it at night knowing its probably not enough to get me in shape on time.

4 weeks out:

Every time I look in the mirror I see a shadow of what used to be me and this weeks I weight in at 14stone 1lb, Things with the family are still a mess and I am still not back staying at home, I am now obsessed with it, I am starting to see that I just don’t have enough time to get in the shape I need and I should stop and sort out my family and take my training a bit easier, I am no longer enjoying it as much as I did and I am missing my wife and Kids.

3 weeks out:

Enough is enough, I now weight 13stone 11lbs, Oh my god 13stone I say to myself, I haven’t weighed that since I was about 10 years old. But after seeing my doctor I have decided enough is enough, I am an emotional wreck, My Job is on the line, My marriage is a mess, I set out to lose weight and make myself happy and in turn I have done the opposite and ended up with my life in a mess.

2 weeks out:

Today is the day I decided its time to sort out my bloody life, I meet my Body builder friend who has helped me and explain what has been going on, he tells me I should have quit weeks ago and my Family is more important and that its not a big deal and I can use the knowledge and experience I have gained to make myself bigger and better for next years comp and give myself plenty time to do.

I go home to my wife and admit I have been an idiot and explain what has been going on in my head, it is not going to be easy but I try and rebuild the mess I have made.

That was 7 months ago:

Today 05/10/09 things are Great, I have learned so much over the last 2 years about myself and my body and also about how losing weight is something that could in turn wreck your life if you are not careful.

In the last 7 months myself and my wife have rebuild what I ruined and she know shares my passion for the Gym and Exercise, She had zero interest before as I was to wrapped up in myself to even think about helping her loose her weight.

We now work as a team and she is now enjoying a new healthy lifestyle and attends the Gym as much as she can and loves her Boxercise class.


In 7 months of me being home my wife has lost an amazing 7 STONE and dropped from a dress size 20 down to an amazing size 10.

My training is better than ever and I am gaining more size all the time and still staying in great shape, I currently weigh around 15stone and I am in the best shape I have ever been in.

I rushed my weight loss and it almost cost me my family and my marriage, They say Rome was not built in a day and that is so true, next year I plan to compete in the First timers and will be in much better shape and frame of mind that I ever was, I now have my best Friend (My Wife) to help me.

The last 2 years I have gained a wealth of knowledge good and bad and just wanted to pass it on to others.

I train 5 Days per week and Now Study Nutrition in my spare time purely as I have strong interest in it like to pass what I have learned on as I know how hard it is to have the guts to get started and do things correctly.


I know this was one hell of a Post but feel I wanted to share as so many people are in the some sort of shape I was and wish they could do well, It can be done, But do it at your own pace.


I m looking forward to the next 6 months more than I ever have.


Thanks for Reading.

Brad

Below is some pictures before and After of both me and the wife to give you an idea.

Me Jan07-April 09


Me March 09


The wife


Me and the Wife 2006:


Me and the wife last Month:


And one of me Last Week just for the Hell of it.

natehall

iTrader: (2)

great story! And the important thing is you sorted it out for your wife

if you had any tips for a 18st 6lb 6ft3 man to lose a couple of stones without joining the gym (i can not stand a lot of the local gyms around here, been a member of 3 now and quite all of them as in all honesty it was a waste of money) about losing weight - what would it be?

Working for myself means getting into a exercise routine is extremely difficult, however I would much prefer to be outdoors than in a gym.

kiddie

What a story! I'd seen your pic of how you look now somewhere on the forum but never knew you had been 'big' before.

That is such dedication! Even for someone with nothing else in the world to do, but to do it in between work, and looking after a family.

Hats of to you mate, and your wife! You both look like different people, get your passport's updated lol.

I wish I had half the dedication you obviously have.

jammerrs

mate thats a fantastic turn around

may i ask how many calaries (protein and whatever else) a day you have to consume to be able to do all that exercise?

and i never knew it could mentally affect you as much as it did, good luck with next years comps

DANO.0161

Well done Bradz looking in great condition some hard dedication has paid off well for you. well it's just put in the mood to get my arse in gear and go to the gym lol

rsnissan

iTrader: (9)

thats inspiring mate..........................well done for sorting out your personal life intime and turning the whole thing into a positive

just started back at the gym doing C.V at lunch time and want to bulk out a bit as well so this has given me a boost

dave cos4x4

iTrader: (5)

excellent read Brad, really glad you have sorted yourself out.

the two of you have done amazing loosing the weigh you have.

you both look like different people, well done both of you.

Cragrat

iTrader: (4)

Bloody hell what a difference
Just wish I could hav that kind of dedication
Nice one

As said passport update ya photos

Benni

Your wife isn't a bad looking lady without the weight. Anyway, I'm glad you got your marriage back on track and all that. Was a good read that. You reminded me of Max from Max and Paddy when you explained how you were as a doorman.

Good luck with the future...

Benni.

dave cos4x4

iTrader: (5)

How did your wife lose that much weight?

she must of worked really hard to get to where she is now,completely different woman.

studabear

sounded like a real roller coaster, congratulations, as said wouldn't recognise either of you the amount you have changed

Do you fancy sharing a bit of your diet plan?

Ollie.

Well done Brad! Was it john that was giving you advice?

You on the Melanotan im guessing?

RSMK4TURBO

Credit to you mate really is, all the best and keep up the good work.

robocos

Inspirational read and well done to you both.

Coldo

Awesome stuff.
Your old thread inspired me to do a similar thing. Anything is possible with a bit of dedication.

You an your missus look like different folk!

Bradz

Thanks for the nice words Guys



It sure was John mate and Yea i am a Melanotan addict lol

KSA-Cossie

iTrader: (4)

Well done to you and your mrs m8.

pete26

Holy fuck!!!!!!

Use both look like different people, I was pretty much the same through school but like they say eating is for comfort when ur getting called names. At the gym myself everyday, getting there but i know it won't happen over night. There was another thread about a guys progress, was loads of inspirtion, can't member who Well done

Red16

Wow... what a transformation for the pair of you! Your newfound active lifestyles will have a positive effect on the children too

Impressive stuff... keep at it!

Ollie.

Im meeting him in a bit hes down my way today. How did you find it? PM if you want. Cheers!

3i_gaz

good read that!!!

your missus looks proper well now!!!

good looking pair of fookers lol

Nath

I don't often pop in here but I'm glad I did. Great read and a very interesting one, but the outcome is just tops, fair play and well done

Charlie Chalk

iTrader: (1)

I can't help but laugh at your daughters expression on the right picture





Massive difference, Good stuff mate.. and the wife looks stunning.

Kverna

iTrader: (1)

Soo.. You started using girl panties and your daughter is upset.. Great result


Just kidding, great result the both of you

dave cos4x4

iTrader: (5)

thats some transformation in 8 moths!

well done again.

Stu @ M Developments

iTrader: (12)

Incredible. You both look so much better and I bet your both so much happier within yourselves now.

Reading this has just pushed me to get back outside and do an hour in the Gym. Top man.

louie1

Well done to you both, Me and my missus have been back in the gym for about 3 months now and its all good.
Takes a good story like your's to realise its possible if you put in the time.
all the best for the future!

Lee_R21Turbo

iTrader: (1)

Fair play Brad - thats an awesome achievement but good on your for realising that your family is more important & for getting it sorted with your missus.

Both looking really good fella - well done!!

Dicko&Vacant

iTrader: (3)

awesome achievement on both of your parts.

Your story reminds me of a lot of the slimmers i read in our magazines ( I'm a Slimming World Consultant ) and how sometimes people let it take over their lives and become too obsessed with it all.

Well done, and glad you sorted your marriage out

Maria.

Wow wow and wow!

Fantastic Read!

Fair friggin play!

boothy

iTrader: (14)

Holy fuck you both look great Good work great story!!

Mr Brannen

Awesome reading Brad, an inspiration for anyone to do it the right way, just a quick one though, when you were fat did anyone ever say to you that you looked like that lotto lout Michael Carrol? LOL

stu da rude

Epic story mate, i take my hat off too you! I was in a similar position at the start of this year, knocking on the door of 19 stone and convinced that as i was quite tall i was carrying it well.. Until i saw pics from our new years eve party and i could not believe just how i'd managed to convince myself for so long that i looked 'ok'...

So i got back in the gym, and over the course of 3 months made next to no difference, so naturally got really despondant and wanted to jack it all in, i figured it was a waste of time..

And then, i got made redundant.. This was rock bottom for me, so i decided after much wallowing in self pity to get up and do something about it once and for all. I got back to the gym and booked in for a few PT sessions to get me on track and get a program generated that i could stick too..

As i write this i weighed in at 16stone on the nose this morning, and am averaging overall about 2lbs' loss per week, it has slowed of late, but im grateful for every lb to be honest!

So yeah, i can see where you were coming from, and kudos for realising before it was too late how important everything else is; its too easy to get drawn into wanting to do more and such!

Anyway, good work fella, its an effort well made, and without sounding homo you're looking pretty good so fair play!

smokey

Thats was a greta read Bradz! Loved it and you two look great!

Mk1-stu

one hell of a story there fella, but well done for sorting yourself out.

marky_g

ah mate thats grate didnt read much but pitures say a 1000 words keep it up mate

TimC

iTrader: (1)

Wow, what a read.

I remember you writing a while ago about you deciding not to compete but didnt realise how bad it had got for you.
Glad to hear how you have changed it all back around for the better.

Please keep writing, really inspiring stuff

Tim

Pardeep

Once again dude, Just pure amazing. I've lost enough weight but trying to get a little bigger with the weights and tone it all out. The Cardio is killing me but i feel the difference in my breathing especially since i stopped smoking too

rstel1

nice one brad!! thats a good story glad you got yourself back on track with your family and friends.
keep up the training!! lol

RANJ

awesome mate